III. PERSONIFICATION.
• 1. The Nature and Origin of Personification. Personification consists in attributing personality, oi some of the attributes of personality, to an inanimate object, because of a fancied resemblance to a living be¬ing. The philosophy of this figure leads us far into the mysteries of mythology, and throws a flood of light upon the genesis of myths. To the inhabitants of the infant world, every thing was animated with an indi¬vidual life. "We cannot realize that sentiment with which the eye of antiquity dwelt on these sights of na¬ture. To us all is law, order, necessity. We calculate the refractory power of the atmosphere, we measure the possible length of the dawn in every climate, and thesrising of the sun is to us no greater surprise than the birth of a child. But if we could believe again, that there was in the sun a being like our own, that in the dawn there was a soul open to human sympathy,— if we could bring ourselves to look for a moment upon these powers as personal, free, and adorable, how dif¬ferent would be our feelings at the blush of day." * But prior to reflection all motion is the product of will, and will implies personality. Consciousness teaches us that our movements emanate from a volition, radiate from a conscious subject, and, before the rise of natural philosophy, it would be easy for man to people the earth, the sea, and the sky with personalities like his own. Thus, say a certain school of comparative my¬thologists, every word was a personifying metaphor, and in time, its significanct fading from memory, it was supposed to designate a real being—a hero or a god. "In the ancient poetical and proverbial language of Elia," says Muller, "people said, Selene moon loves and watches Endymion sun', instead of the sun is setting and the moon is rising;' ' Selene kisses Endymion into sleep,' instead of, it is night.' These expressions remained long after their meaning had ceased to be understood ; and as the human mind is generally as anxious for a reason as ready to invent one, a story arose by common consent, and without any personal effort, that EndfmiOn must have been a young lad loved by a young lady Selene." 2. Personification Natural to Man. This poetic instinct of the earliest men has not wholly died out in the human breast. A spark still survives, and as the feelings are aroused, " And as imagination bodies forth The form of things unknown," it touches abstractions with its Promethean fire, and breathes into their nostrils the breath of life. Thus Wordsworth gives personality to age : "Aga I twine thy brows with fresh spring flowers, And call • *rain of laughing Hours, And bid them dance, and bid them sing ; And thou, too, mingle in the ring!" 8. Personification in Oratory. But not in poetry alone is personification a mural form of expression. It vivifies the grandest oratory. Curran, speaking of Irish independence, says, "I sat by her cradle, and I have followed her hearse." Fired with the noble theme of freedom, he conceives of uni¬versal emancipation as a living genius, presiding over British soil, and clothed with all the majesty of beneficent power : "I speak in the spirit of British law, which makes liberty commensurate with and inseparable from the British soil, which proclaims even to the stranger and the sojourner, the moment he sots his foot on British earth, that the soil on which he treads is holy, and con¬secrated by the genius of Universal Emancipation. No matter in what language his doom may have been pro¬nounced; no matter what complexion incompatible with freedom an Indian or an African sun may have burned upon him ; no matter in what disastrous battle his liberties may have been cloven down ; no matter with what solemnities he may have been devoted on the altar of slavery,—the moment he touches the sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the god sink together in the dust, his soul walks abroad in her own majesty, his body swells beyond the chains that burst from around him, and he stands redeemed, regenerated, and dis¬enthralled by the irresistible genius of Universal Emancipation." A single sentence like this will impress the sub¬limity of a sentiment more forcibly than a folio of abstract propositions logically deduced from an axiom. 4. Forms of Personification. Two forms of personification may be distinguished : (1) that which ascribes personality to inanimate ob¬jects; and (2) that which attributes to an inanimate object some quality of a living being. (1) Personality Ascribed.—The first form is likely to seem forced except in the highest flights of poetry. and oratory. Milton uses it with power in describing the grief of nature over the sin of Eve "Earth felt the wound ; and Nature from her seat Sighing, through all her works gave signs of we, That all was lost." Wordsworth thus invests religion with the terrors of an unnatural maternity : "Sacred Religion, mother of form and fear, Dread arbitress of mutable respect New rites ordaining when the old are wrecked, Or cease to please the fickle worshiper." Shelley breathes a soul into the cloud which makes it seem almost a sister : I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers From the seas and the streams ; I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noonday dreams. From my wings are shaken the dews that waken The sweet buds every one, When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, As she dances about the sun. I wield the flail of the lashing hail And whiten the green plains under; And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder." (2) qualities of Life Attributed.—The second form of personification is more common, and pervades all animated speech and writing. While it does not affirm personality, it implies the possession of life by inanimate objects. It appears in such expressions as, "the thirsty soil," "ravenous famine," "angry tem¬pest," and the like. What unutterable loneliness in these lines by Leigh Hunt : "A ghastly castle that eternally • Holds its blind visage out to the lens sea." Category:Character